Why do Weekends Pass so Quickly?

This past week went by SO slow. I was SO ready for Friday. It felt like the entire week was a day behind. We usually eat at home during the week but Josh asked if I wanted to go out for crab cakes Thursday night. There's a sports bar in the city that has them on special Thursday nights. We got a Groupon for this place a while back & we've been hanging on to it for a night like this. We just wanted to get out & do something a little different. We really enjoyed ourselves & the crab cakes were pretty good. Definitely not the best I've had, but good for the price.

Friday afternoon finally came & I couldn't have been happier. We were both pretty exhausted from the week so we made dinner together & watched some TV for the rest of the night.

Saturday was a great day. We had some errands to run so we got them out of the way first. There's a new pet shop in the shopping center across from our apartment so we decided to take a look. We like to go to places like that periodically & look at tropical fish & all sorts of other pets & accessories. We've kind of always done things like that. Now it's definitely much more fun knowing we'll get a dog in the next few months or so. We actually played with one of the puppies there just for fun. We don't want to get a puppy from a pet shop & it's a breed we've already ruled out. It was still fun though & she was adorable. We went to the library after that. I've been wanting to go to the library for a few weeks now to pick up a few books & it keeps getting put off. I picked up a ton of books as usual & Josh even got a few. I picked up a few dog & herb gardening books, along with a few for leisurely reading. I picked up Marley & Me. I've been wanting to read it since I saw the movie. It's pretty good so far. The books I wanted most were all checked out so I put them on reserve. We'll probably be going back next weekend to pick them up. Josh even got a few books, I was surprised because he's not much of a reader at all. We lounged around, played some games & read our books Saturday until our game came on. It was an absolutely horrible game! I actually kept reading my books most of the way through because it was just too painful to watch :-/ This season has definitely been a letdown!

Today has been a great day. We got up to go try a new church. We really enjoyed this church & I'm sure we'll go back again. It's both our favorites so far but we'll probably try a few more before we decide which one to make our home church up here. We met the preacher & his wife. The were both really welcoming, along with the rest of the congregation. It's a small church so we think it will be really easy to meet other people. There are a decent amount of young couples & families so that's a plus.

We didn't bother to check the weather, we just bundled up because it was cold & wet yesterday. It was actually a very nice day out. It was pretty warm & sunny, especially since it was a February morning! It was bittersweet. It was nice for a little bit of warm weather, but all the snowmen are gone & there's barely any snow left except the mounds left in parking lots from the snow plows. I'm really surprised at how I've adjusted to the weather. I thought I was going to hate the winter here because I always did back home. I hated it because it was always cold & dreary looking. More times than not, the winter precipitation we got was sleet or something of the sort. This winter here has been a little colder than back home, but not a huge difference despite the lack of random spring-like days. The big difference is that it has been beautiful. We've had snow on the ground for about a week until it started melting a few days ago...& I really liked having it around :-) It felt like winters I used to see in cartoons as a child instead of a cold, wet mess. While today was warm & sunny, I don't think winter is quite over yet :-) Our groundhog thought so, but I think he's clueless :-) I hope we get at least one more decent snow. If we don't & spring sneaks up on me faster than I expect, I'll welcome it with open arms. I may not be quite ready for winter to be over, but Spring has always been my favorite season. It's also the only season I haven experienced in MD yet, so I'm really looking forward to it. It just seems like Winter has passed by so quickly. I'm really starting to believe that time goes by faster as you get older...it's sure starting to feel like it, at least during the weekends.

I can't believe this weekend is almost over already! We'll spend the rest of the night watching the Super Bowl...although I'm not super excited about it, I don't care for either team. I'll pull for whichever score will win us some money I guess :-) I'm sure there will be some great commercials though.

CHOCOLATE Cake!!!

There's just something about chocolate that I love. It's perfect for a bad day...or even a good one of course. It's right up there for ice cream for me...definitely one of my favorite food groups :-)

During my snow day last week I decided to make a chocolate cake. I used to bake cakes a lot. I'm not really sure what happened but I haven't baked one in forever. I love baking, there's something peaceful about it...and cake batter is simply amazing! Josh doesn't really care for sweets much but he does love a good chocolate cake or brownies.

I got this recipe from this Better Homes & Gardens cookbook. This was one of the first cookbooks I bought & actually used.

The cake itself turned out kind of ugly this time. I'll blame it on the consistency of the icing. I ran out of powder sugar & there's not much I could do about it! It's still delicious.


Ingredients
3/4 c butter (room temp)
2 eggs (room temp)
2/3 c unsweetened cocoa powder
2/3 c boiling water
2/3 c buttermilk
2 t vanilla
2 1/4 all purpose flour
1 1/2 t baking soda
1/8 t salt
3/4 granulated sugar
3/4 c packed brown sugar

Frosting of choice (I made Chocolate Sour Cream frosting...Delicious!)

Directions
1. Grease & flour 2 9-inch cake pans & preheat oven to 350.

2. Whisk together cocoa powder & boiling water until smooth. Let cool for 10 minutes. Whisk in buttermilk & vanilla.

3. Stir together dry ingredients & set aside.

4. Beat butter, add sugars until combined. Add eggs, one at a time, beat until combined. Beat in 1/3 of flour mixture until just combined. Beat in 1/2 chocolate mixture. Beat in 1/2 remaining flour mixture, remaining chocolate mixture then remaining flour mixture until combined.

5. Divide batter between pans, bake 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool on wire rack 10 minutes, remove from pan then cool completely on wire rack.

6. Trim cake down to even out (I love to snack on the cake top while I'm decorating & waiting on the cake to cool). I brushed the top of each layer of Mocha flavored Kahlua. It adds just a little bit of a mocha flavor (Great for Josh, & not too much of a coffee flavor for me).

7. To avoid cake crumbs in the frosting, brush off any crumbs then ice with a very thin layer of icing. Now ice over this.

I meant to take step by step pictures but I got ahead of myself. I'll try to remember next time.

Puppy Love

One of the many reasons I can't wait for us to get our house is because I can't wait to get a puppy! I always had a dog growing up. I have a dog that I had to leave with my dad when I left for college but I couldn't take her now. She's used to having a large yard to run in with her brother & sisters. My little niece is so attached to her. I miss her a lot but I know she is happiest where she is now. This is her with my niece the day after Christmas. She didn't want to sit still for this picture so she doesn't look very happy here. Haha. Anyway, she's a 7 year old Pit & she's an amazing dog. I know Pits have a bad reputation but this one wouldn't hurt a fly, unless you mess with one of us...you might regret that :-)

Josh loves her just as much as I do. We have considered getting a Pit but they have so much energy, I would just feel bad getting one without a huge yard for it to run in. I LOVE American Bulldogs. They're a bit bigger & more wrinkly. I love all types of dogs, but there's just something about a wrinkly dog with big feet :-) You might remember me talking about a dog from when I worked at the vet when we first moved up here. His name was Mack & he was an American Bulldog. He was gorgeous! He was pretty big, close to 100 lbs. & still growing, but he was just a huge baby! Here is an American Bull puppy...so adorable!!! They're just as cute when the grow up too!


I also love Bullmastiffs. I think I love them equally but Josh likes American Bulls better.


We've considered TONS of other breeds but these are our favorites & most likely choices. We've eliminated a lot for different reasons. Long or thick hair, temperament, energy level, too common, etc. We hope to have one by Christmas time. I'll definitely post when we decide for sure & get one!

Delicious Lasagna!

Lasagna is one of my favorite meals & it's something I probably make about once a month. I make a spinach lasagna that I love but the most recent one is definitely my favorite! I got my inspiration here but of course I changed the recipe a bit :-) I think the next time I make this sauce, I'll make a double batch so I can freeze some & have it on hand. I had a little bit left over after this, maybe enough for a small lunch size portion of pasta. I would like to try this sauce again with fresh herbs, other than that, I don't think I would make any changes.

Ingredients

1 pound sweet Italian sausage
3/4 pound lean ground beef
1/2 cup shallots, diced
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
2 (6 ounce) cans tomato paste
1 can diced tomatoes, undrained
2 tablespoons white sugar
2 teaspoons dried basil leaves
1 tablespoon thyme
1 tablespoon oregano
1/2 tablespoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 tablespoons dried parsley
lasagna noodles
15 ounces ricotta cheese
1 egg
Shredded mozzarella
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Directions

1. Cook sausage, ground beef, shallots , and garlic over medium heat until browned. Puree crushed tomatoes in food processor. Add tomato puree, tomato paste, and diced tomatoes. Add seasoning. Simmer, covered, for about 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.

( I made some changes here because I didn’t have tomato sauce on hand. I had tons of stewed tomatoes, diced tomatoes & crushed tomatoes so I just pureed some of them, it turned out perfect! I couldn’t find any fennell seeds at the grocery store or I would have added them :-/ Even without them, this was the best sauce I’ve ever made! I only used half the amount of salt from the original recipe because I don’t care for very salty sauces. )

2. In a mixing bowl, combine ricotta cheese with egg, a little dried parsley, nutmeg & about ½ cup shredded mozzarella.

3. Prepare lasagna noodles. (I never cook my noodles. You can either get the no-bake kind or you can soak the regular kind in warm water for about 20 minutes, while you prepare your other ingredients.)

4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

5. To assemble, spread 1 1/2 cups of meat sauce in the bottom of a 9x13 inch baking dish. Arrange noodles over meat sauce. Spread 1/3 of the ricotta mixture. Top with mozzarella. Add meat sauce. Repeat layers (I had 4 layers for my lasagna). Cover with foil & bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes. Remove foil, and bake an additional 15 minutes.

Snow Day!!!

Tuesday night/Wednesday morning we got the first of our latest snow storm. We were supposed to get about 1-3". I didn't really expect to get even that...we definitely got our 3"! The road crews apparently didn't expect to get much either. The roads were horrible going to work Wednesday morning. It kept snowing/raining/sleeting throughout the day so my office closed down early. I left work around 2:30 & I'm glad I did. The rush hour commute in some areas were horrible! It was taking people over 5 hours to get home & some were even stuck over night. People were leaving their cars on the sides of roads & staying in hotels. A lot of people lost power & some areas still don't have any. We definitely got lucky. We went to Costco & Lowe's to pick up a few things after work. Can you believe Lowe's didn't have any snow scrapers? They have 3 aisles of gardening supplies but no snow scrapers! We do have one but it's tiny & completely useless for anything other than frost. We picked up a shovel & left to go grocery shopping. It was sleeting SO hard outside. It was huge sleet & it was falling so fast, I've never seen sleet like that. We picked up our groceries & headed home.

I already knew the chances of me going to work the next day were not very high. I didn't think my boss would be there & without her there for a second day in a row there wouldn't be much for me to do. I planned on making a super yummy dinner for Thursday so I made the homemade sauce for my lasagna (it takes about 2 hours from start to finish), assembled the lasagna & made dinner for that night. We just relaxed & watched TV for the rest of the night. We were expecting 5-10" of snow in our area. It did most of the snowing before we even went to bed. It's so weird when it snows at our apartment. It's so bright! We ended up getting around 9" or so. My boss lives north of Baltimore & she got around 13". College park only got 4" & the areas closer to the coast only got a little over an inch. All of those areas are within about 40 minutes or so from us. We saw on the news that it was actually thundering & lightning in some areas. My boss said it was at her house. It's crazy! Obviously it was really pretty yesterday. I kept all the blinds open so I could enjoy the snow from the warmth of my apartment :-).

Josh went to work late & worked late. I was a little bummed he didn't get to stay home with me but it turned out to be a good thing. I was super productive! I got a lot of things done around the apartment that I've been putting off for a while. We moved some of the furniture around to accommodate the Christmas tree. Since we took it down, there's been an awkward open space where it used to be. I re-arranged our living room & it's a lot more open now! It's not exactly how I would like it, but with the shape of our living room makes it impossible to arrange it the way I would prefer. That's ok though, the shape gives us space for a bigger balcony.


I put the words above the couch several months ago but I don't think I ever took a picture. They used to be centered above the couch but I had to move it to make room for the love seat to go in front of the window. Now I'm trying to figure out what to do with them. Do I leave them where they are? Do I center them above where the couch is now? Do I spread them out & center them on the wall? What would you do with them? It seems that there's something wrong with each option. Symmetry really bothers me sometimes. Stupid OCD! Anyway, I like the living room this way SO much better!

Russett

Josh and I had a great time looking at houses with our real estate agent this weekend. We had lunch at Chik-Fil-A in a shopping center near a neighborhood called Russett that we really like. They had a hostess who cleaned tables & got you refills. I've never been to one with a hostess! Anyway, we really like that area & we even saw some houses we liked a lot. Of course, these won't be available when we're ready to make offers. It's still a ton of fun though! Here are some of our favorites...

This was the favorite kitchen. I LOVED this townhome. The bedrooms were huge & the master suite took up the entire top floor. Of course it couldn't be perfect...the living room & dining room were tiny & the only outdoor area was a very small patio off the dining room.

This was one of my favorite bathrooms. I couldn't pick just one :-)

This is the other favorite bathroom. It's in the master bathroom of the townhome with the favorite kitchen.

We got a little lost because the GPS couldn't find one of the roads. We saw someone getting arrested! I've never seen anyone get arrested so I took a picture.

Our favorite overall house was the last one we looked at but the area wasn't our favorite. My camera died right after we walked in the door (I forgot to charge it like always).

Weekly Recap

This week has really been a great one! Work has been going very well. I finished my first project! The client & my boss were both very happy with it. YAY! Once it is officially approved we will be producing the product in the plant. I'm technically not completely finished with it, I'll have to be out on the floor for the first run to make sure everything goes smoothly. I'm finished directly working with it in the lab. I'm really excited about it :-)

I realized I'll be watching American Idol this season. I usually don't watch it very much after the embarrassing auditions. This year there's someone on there from my home town! I definitely have to watch it now! She grew up in St. Pauls, I used to check out her mom's groceries when I worked at the Piggly Wiggly in high school :-) Small world. I'm so very excited for her & I hope she goes all the way! Here is her audition video. The guy in the back of the car (at 1:17) with her was my teacher in high school. He sang at my wedding! He should definitely be on there too!

We met with a lender yesterday. We've been on the right track. We won't have any problem getting approved for the range we want to stay in. The lender cleared up a lot of questions for us so I feel much better about the whole process now. :-) We have a more concrete time line figured out now :-) I'm SO excited

Today we'll be going to look at houses with a real estate agent for the first time. We're aware that it's not likely that the houses we look at today will be on the market when we're ready to put in an offer. It will be nice to get a better look at different areas & neighborhoods to get an idea of where we're most interested in looking :-)